Developer tool
Ariadne
Faster output is only useful if the work can still be checked.
Ariadne is the installable developer tool I built and still maintain for software work done with AI.
It splits a job into roles, checks each step with tests and evidence before accepting it, retries what fails, and keeps a record so a release can be validated or rolled back.
The problem
Agents could generate work faster than I could reliably verify it.
I kept hitting the same wall while building with AI: output arrived faster than review. Accepting it on confidence meant shipping work nobody could trace; refusing it meant giving up the speed.
Ariadne is the answer I wanted to use: structure the work so every step is checked before it is accepted.
The model
One job becomes stages with gates between them.
The workflow is documented in the project's own WORKFLOW.md: six stages from routing and discovery through to ship-and-learn, with human approval gates that no automated step can pass.
- S0–S1Route + Discover
- S2Research
- S3Direct
- S4Build
- S5Verify
- S6Ship & Learn
Human approval gates
- Direction Lock
- Dependency
- Build Complete
- Ship
- Publish
Every gate is human-only: no automated stage can pass one.
The gates
Five decisions stay human.
Each gate is a point where work stops until a person accepts it. The gates are the product's central claim: the system can execute, but it cannot approve itself.
Direction Lock
The problem and the approach are agreed before work starts.
Dependency
What the work depends on is accepted before it is built on.
Build Complete
The build is not finished until its evidence exists.
Ship
Nothing leaves the machine without an explicit acceptance.
Publish
A release is a decision, not a side effect of a passing build.
The checks
Every stage is accepted against something checkable.
Checks run for implementation, review, release and rollback, and the record keeps what was verified and what was not. A failed step is retried rather than waved through.
Releases carry a validated update and rollback path, so a bad release has a defined way back.
- Stages
- Six, from routing to ship-and-learn.
- Human gates
- Five; automation cannot pass them.
- Checks
- Implementation, review, release, and rollback.
- Recovery
- Retry on failure; validated update and rollback path.
Current release
A working system, not a demo.
Ariadne is public on GitHub, and Boreal's workbench is built on the same engine, the strongest evidence the system does what it says.
Working now
- An installable developer tool, public on GitHub, with six documented stages and five human-only approval gates.
- Automated checks for implementation, review, release, and rollback, with retry on failure.
- A validated update and rollback path.
Still open
- The engine has one real product on top of it so far: Boreal.
- The repository has the full implementation and the workflow documentation.